The present invention relates to an input control apparatus, a display control apparatus, and a display apparatus used for the control unit of an equipment for manufacturing semiconductor devices.
For example, in the photolithography process of the semiconductor device manufacturing processes, a resist coating process for forming a resist film on the surface of a semiconductor wafer (to be referred to as a wafer hereinafter) and a developing process for developing the wafer after the wafer coated with the resist film is exposed. The resist coating process and the developing process are conventionally performed by a predetermined sequence in a composite process system equipped with the corresponding process machines.
Sequence control in this system is generally performed by a control unit using a personal computer or the like. The control unit is connected to a man-machine interface such as a touch panel type display. System configuration editing, monitor method setting, and the like in the above respective processes are performed through this display.
In system configuration editing, for example, a series of processes and the processing contents of each process are displayed in the form of, e.g., a table. All the sequence processes are not often displayed due to a limited display area of the display. In particular, this tendency is more pronounced in a system having the composite process described above because the system has a large number of processes. For this reason, some of the series of processes are displayed, and at the same time, the remaining processes can be displayed by a so-called scroll function or the like.
A conventional display has a table to be scrolled and scroll buttons. The scroll buttons include line scroll buttons and page scroll buttons. Upon clicking on one line scroll button, the lines on the immediately preceding page are scrolled and displayed. Upon clicking on the other line scroll button, the lines on the immediately succeeding page are scrolled and displayed. Upon clicking on one page scroll button, the preceding pages are sequentially scrolled and displayed. Upon clicking on the other page scroll button, the succeeding pages are sequentially scrolled and displayed.
To prevent continuous scrolling upon clicking on a wrong button a plurality of number of times consecutively, e.g., to prevent 2-line or 2-page scrolling upon clicking on a wrong button two times consecutively a predetermined interval for regulating click-on is defined between the first click-on of a given button and the second click-on of the given button. For example, if this interval is about 0.3 sec, the second click-on of the given button within 0.3 sec after the first click-on of the given button is not counted or is regarded as an invalid input.
This regulation prohibits continuous scrolling of a plurality of lines or pages. That is, in continuously scrolling the display contents by a plurality of lines or pages, the above button is consecutively clicked on a plurality of number of times. The click-on within the above interval cannot be counted, and scrolling cannot advance at a desired speed.